Have you read ...?

We now have one group of teens settling in at their hotel for the evening in New York City... maybe. And its starting to look like they might escape to Whateley without getting involved in whatever events have been stirring up the hornets' nest. Well, we're not done with them yet. But first... let's introduce some more Gen 2 students!

And it's serious about it these days. Hard to believe its the end of January already. The month went by faster than I thought... as I discovered this morning when I found a couple late notices in my email for utility bills that I should have paid by last week. Oops.

On the bright side, more time passed means more story releases. Today's content, from Elrod (with bits and pieces from a number of us, including some folks not on the canon list), is a piece called "Odds and Ends" ... and it's a bit of an end of semester wrap up, with some combat finals and end of school year stuff to finalize things so we can move on to the new school year. You can, as usual, find this story over in the Content->Canon Stories section. Enjoy!

293End of January already!/index.php/visit/item/293-end-of-january-already

When last we saw our Gen 2 teens, they were loaded into a large airport hotel shuttle bus burning rubber on its exit from the JFK Airport in NYC just in time to avoid a sudden arrival of SWAT, MCO, and an entire bowl full of alphabet soup agency quick reaction units. The kids are on their way into Midtown, to a Comfort Inn within walking distance of Hell's Kitchen, the Theatre District / Broadway, and... Central Park. Knowing that something has the locals acting like the anthill has been kicked over, the smart thing for a bunch of mutant kids to do would be to pile into the cozy hotel rooms the Academy has arranged for them, power up the entertainment systems, and order some room service in teen sized (or Energizer sized) portions.

But this is a Whateley Academy story... and put mutants + New York City + holiday into the same pages... you don't have to be a probability warper to guess that this isn't going to go anywhere near that smoothly.

I'm sure lots of people were hoping for another helping of Calimari today. Including some Gen 2 authors who gave me dirty looks when I posted a list of what I intend to release over the next several Mondays. Yes, when I return to the staff lounge later, I will need to make a few 'check for traps' rolls...

However, I want to get something else in your hands that E.E. put together and promised you back before the holidays. This is a little something he put together using Dragon Dictate and wanted to share to thank everyone for their generousity and help with his medical treatments. It's called "Game Time" and it'll fit in with all the Star Wars talk going on lately... though it's based on The Old Republic, the MMO version of the old history well before even the prequel trilogy. You can find it in our Content->Library section.

Ok... last week was all about Gen 2 and the new team kicking off the second time line. This week, being the first week of a New Year, is an entirely appropriate time to begin our discussion of the future of the Whateley Academy. And its past. Or, more specifically... now that we have a second group of authors working on stories, what are we planning to do about keeping the new from overshadowing the old... and for further expanding on the world of the Whateley Academy.

Well, first of all; I want people to know that while we haven't hung up a real physical sign saying 'help wanted' ... we are obviously aware that the author roster for the original timeline is a little spare. And we intend to do some things to resolve that issue. But before we get to aggressive with that, we're looking at doing some organizing of our backlog... the plans, the plot lines, the foreshadowing, and all the rest of the things that make it incredibly difficult for us to recruit an author and actually work them into the existing timeline. You only have to look at the student list on the wiki to know that even if someone did come in as a new author, it's not as simple as just saying "Oh yes, I'm writing PoV of this character from the Masterminds who hasn't ever shown up on camera" ... because, we all know who all the members of the Masterminds are.

Obviously, we want good authors. The best way to make sure that we know you can pen a story is to be visibly doing so. Fan Fiction is one way. I'm also open to giving people 'project stories' as trial runs. What this will mean is we'll give you a pre-developed character, someone who if you've been reading Whateley, you will recognize... and a set of conflicts, plot points, and scenes... and have you write the story. Handled well, you'll have a published canon story under your belt even without being officially a canon author. Handled poorly... well, we'll see where the problems are and let you know what areas you need to work on before we would consider you as a canon author.

As we find authors (and we get the original timeline key plotline data reined in), we'll add a couple more authors to the original timeline writing. Some of the Gen 2 authors might also step into working on Gen 1 characters in the same way that Gen 1 authors may have a Gen 2 character they are working on. This will, of course, depend on how they're meeting their Gen 2 story commitments and so on. And then, other authors not specifically detailed to Gen 1 or 2 may begin working on the 'Gen 3' concept... which atm is sounding more like a non-timeline than a timeline specific group. One focused on telling stories from before the 1990s or after 2025... or otherwise 'outside' the bounds of what we'd worry about causing continuity issues for the original timeline or Gen 2.

So if you have an interest in being a Whateley writer and missed the chance to join the Gen 2 project, stay tuned in the next few months. There are also some potential openings for an editor or two... which would mean, yes, having access to canon backstory details and seeing stories long before they release... of course, we all know that the editors would more than earn that access. Opportunities may soon appear.

I've spent most of my spare time over the past week considering how to introduce this story. The ideas have ranged from "I'll let it speak for itself" supershort up to another variation on the Gen 2 announcement a couple weeks back, talking about the authors and characters. Ultimately, I decided what needed mention was something about how 'we' as a community move forward. And I had most of that written when I realized that I was using entirely too many words for what is actually a relatively simple concept:

E. E. Nalley's gofundme project to cover medical expenses for his neck injuries that impact his hands and thus his ability to write has raised $1100 (goal was $700). The project is still 'open' if you are interested in chipping in to make sure E. E. gets the care he needs. More details available at the gofundme project or in the forums.

No matter what your religious, spiritual, or family traditions might be; I'd like to take this moment to offer my well wishes to all of you. From authors who I speak with nearly every day to readers who never register or actively participate in the community in any way; I hope all of you and your family have a wonderful holiday season.

For those of you who do not actively follow the forums discussions, I'd like to share something that came up this week. Most people may not be aware but E.E. injured his neck during the summer and has been having more and more trouble as the year progressed. One of the side effects of this alignment problem is that he has been experiencing increased problems with his hands... which greatly impacts both his regular employment and his writing. He has seen a doctor and they believe they can restore things with a series of treatments. Most of this is covered by insurance, but there are still some co-pay and other issues that he will need money to cover. To support this, E.E. has set up a gofundme project. This has already met its base goal due to the extreme generosity of a fan; however, I hope people will still consider tossing something in the hat to help out if you can manage it. I'm sure we all know that when dealing with medical stuff, there are always extra costs... even if its just a tank of gas to drive to the appointments.

For today's new content, we're going to break in the Library section and give you something else from Bek. Enjoy "Chain of Custody" over in the Library shelves. This belongs in the Erinyes universe, if you're looking for similar stories. I don't think most of the Erinyes stories have gotten moved over here yet...

Up next?

Well, we're rapidly approaching the release of the Gen 2 universe. We've also got some more combat finals and a bit more end of semester stuff before diving into the Fall 2007 school year. There's also one final section of Whisper in my 'to be published' pile.

For the next three weeks, my life mostly revolves around providing a wonderful holiday experience for families in the Sacramento region. This season we're doing a pseudo-Panto / musical version of Cinderella, which means our seating is filled with tiny girls with long braids and tiaras who still think being a Princess is their number one goal in life. My job, amidst the chaos, is to wrangle the noise. Or, more 'officially', I'm the live mix engineer... in a one person sound department.

I have twelve of twenty some cast members in body mics (8 Sennheiser XSW 12, 4 Audio Technica System 10) and use some area pickup to support the ensemble/chorus numbers (3 Crown PCC-160's). Additionally, there's a four person / five instrument (Keyboard, percussion, violin, electric bass / trumpet - yeah, he plays both bass and trumpet, unusual combination, isn't it?)... and while the space isn't really large enough to NEED the band reinforced, they are mic'd or direct lined so I have some control over their volume (and just to have them in the mix so the band and voices sound 'together'). All that is run through our old fully manual Allen and Heath GL3300. Because 'most' of the mix isn't stable until we start doing tech/dress runs (and we only have 1 before we start having audience present), I never have an opportunity to create a prompt script (my hands are busy on the controls at the times I would need to be writing down level changes), So the full mix is done, from memory and based on the live quality in the room on a fully manual board.

So if I happen to sound a little brain dead at any point in the month of December... you know why.

Fortunately, you don't need me to do much more than introduce the next couple week's content releases. And now that that is mostly automated, I should be able to do that even in the midst of my live mix stupor. :)

I don't really have much to say this week. Things are settling in on the site operations. Still plenty of old stories to transfer over, of course, but most people seem to be getting used to the new site. We've announced the new author team for Gen 2 and there's a possibility of posting some more teasers about the core characters or the world differences; but I don't have anything along that line yet. The original timeline has us wrapping up the 2006-2007 school year, so we're going to be introducing some new characters there fairly soon... a whole new freshman class to join in with the other three classes of known students.

There are presents starting to pile up under the tree. There's a story sized package from the Gen 2 team that says "don't open until AFTER Christmas" that is probably 'episode 1 - part 1' ... whatever that story happens to be called. And.. what's this... hmm... looks like you're getting a holiday special from Bek, too. More than one, even. One of them even says you get to open it early.... guess that goes on the slate for next week. I have a sneaky suspicion that there's more to put under the tree still too. Should be a fairly happy holiday around here. Even if I don't share this Scotch I got...

Looks like the first thing for you to look at is a little martial arts flick... "Charging Buffalo, Hidden Dragon" that Elrod has put together for you.

Oh... the scotch? It's an affordable bottle of Dewars. There's a nice 40 yr Balvenie I'd like to try if you're looking for presents to put under the tree. Just make sure Enid doesn't get her hards on it. Would hate to waste a $5000 bottle of scotch on that lush muse... she can stay toasty just fine on some 10 yr Glenlivet. ;)